OSHAWA -- At 33 years old, Antonio Carvalho has been a lot of places and seen a lot of things.

Perhaps more so than the usual person at that age.

Whether it was growing up in Sault Ste. Marie, moving down this way and into Ajax or across the pond and to Portugal as a youth, Carvalho got used to being on the move.

That trend continued for much of his formative years as his life took another turn and brought him back to these parts, first into Pickering and then back to the Ajax area before finally settling on Oshawa, where he now makes his home.

Within it all, sports were always a big part of Carvalho's life. But for the most part the focus was on soccer, which shouldn't come as a big surprise considering his Portuguese decent.

That changed, though, while Carvalho was attending Durham College.

There he met Justin Bruckmann, who was making inroads within a sport of a different kind: mixed martial arts.

"I hadn't done any martial arts at the time, but was a fan of the sport when it was kind of more underground," Carvalho recalls. "When I met him I had overheard that he trained and I was interested in that so I decided to go over and have a chat with him.

"I wasn't sure about it at first because I was still trying to play soccer, then one day I decided I wanted to try it and never looked back from there. It's a great feeling to be on the mats."

Indeed he hasn't looked back.

After years of working his way up the ranks of the sport, these days Carvalho finds himself employed by the UFC. His most recent fight with the promotion came last month at UFC 154 in Montreal, where he was the winner of a three-round split decision over Rodrigo Damm.

A win is a win, to be sure, but Carvalho came away from that bout feeling less than impressed with his performance, especially considering he was coming off a convincing first-round knockout win over Daniel Pineda in his previous fight in July.

"For me it was such a good feeling that night," he says in looking back on the Pineda match. "I tried to forget that as much as I could because each fight is different and each opponent is different. It's hard to come off a fight like that and then have this performance, which was kind of lacklustre for me in my opinion.

"As a competitor I always want to perform well and this is a spectator sport. You want to give the fans what they want. I didn't deliver, but hopefully next time I'll do a little better," Carvalho adds.

Just when that next fight comes is anyone's guess. Carvalho figures he'll hear from the UFC soon in that regard, but in the meantime, he is back working and training at Bruckmann's Martial Arts in Oshawa.

And that's no coincidence.

Going back to that first meeting Carvalho had with Bruckmann in college, the two have been fast friends and unwavering in their support of one another in their quests to make a mark in martial arts.